When vengeance strikes in the form of a bullet out for the princess's blood, Princess Aleia VonAuclair must flee the heart of her country in order to protect the people she loves and take back the pieces of her soul she'd lost to the girl she once l...
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Woodsy pine engulfed my senses as I wafted in and out of consciousness. The scent was deliciously inviting and with the previous night's activities weighing down on me, I let out a soft sigh and snuggled further into the solid pillow underneath my cheek.
I inhaled deeply and at another puff of that intoxicating scent, I became fully aware of where I was and who I was with.
My eyelids fluttered open to a room swathed in complete darkness. Even the moonlight couldn't filter through the blinds.
Once my eyes adjusted to the lack of light, I tilted my head up to peer at the sleeping form above me, committing every inch of him to memory. Even asleep, Edrian looked like a cardboard cutout straight from a modelling magazine's latest catalogue.
His dark lashes fanned out over the natural tan of his skin, the high points of his cheekbones slashing over his face with such precision, it contorted the angles of his face with sharp lines and shadows. The swelling of his lips had gone down in the hours we slept, but there was still a prominent bruise.
My hand had a mind of its own and it snaked up from where it had been thrown over his torso to trace an idle path over the side of his face before moving over the slight stubble blemishing his jaw.
I placed a gentle kiss on the underside of his jaw, careful not to stir him awake and detangled my limbs from his as I slid off the bed.
At first, I was supposed to sleep in the guest bedroom with Cara and Lily. Apparently, the bed was large enough to not only fit the three of us but four people, but when the movie had ended and I'd moved to leave his room, Edrian had caged me in with the irresistible weight of his arms and chest.
When I told him I'd just switch rooms in the middle of the night when he was asleep, he threatened to kick Lily and Cara out of bed if he ever found me in the guest bedroom. I chuckled at the memory and bounded down the grand staircase to check on the guards outside.
The large, four-story Georgian home creeped with an eerie air now that everyone was fast asleep. Shadows skittered across every window, dancing when the wind blew the naked branches every which way in the barren garden outside and as I toed softly over the porcelain floorings, the silence echoed to a different kind of deafening.
Once I landed on the main floor, I quickly made my way out the front door, a sweater I stole from Edrian's closet in hand and a pair of fluffy socks on my feet. Bryan and the guards were nowhere to be seen but I knew they were lurking somewhere around the house.
I signed, Can you come out for a moment?
A branch snapped from a nearby bush. A rustle of boots on grass and then Bryan emerged from the corner of the house. It still freaked me out, the way he just seemed to appear then disappear just as quickly.
"Are you okay?"
I nodded and watched as he stopped a few feet away from me.
"I just wanted to check on you. See if you were bored out of your mind yet."
